Seoul says Pyongyang has cut off communications unilaterally

Seoul, Apr 10 (EFE).- The South Korean government said Monday that it believes North Korea has “unilaterally” cut off cross-border telephone communications amid heightened tensions in the peninsula following large-scale joint maneuvers by Seoul and Washington and weapons testing by Pyongyang.

It has been four days since the North Korean regime responded to calls made through civilian and military channels by the South.

On previous occasions, torrential rains, such as those that hit the Korean peninsula last week, damaged communications infrastructure in the North.

However, South Korea’s Unification Ministry, in charge of relations with North Korea, believes that Pyongyang has decided to interrupt them voluntarily and “unilaterally,” the ministry spokesperson Koo Byoung-sam said at a press conference.

On Friday last week, Seoul reported that it did not receive any response to its calls, made regularly at the first and last hour of the working day.

It is likely that the regime has stopped communications in protest against the Seoul-Washington joint military maneuvers currently underway in the region.

Pyongyang has repeatedly issued threats over these exercises, which have included the deployment of US strategic assets such as aircraft carriers and bombers capable of carrying nuclear weapons.

Moreover, during the weekend the allies announced having tested for the first time an underwater drone with nuclear capability.

The last time Pyongyang totally stopped communications was in the summer of 2020 in protest of Seoul’s alleged passivity in the face of anti-regime propaganda being sent by activists from South Korea.

Tensions in the peninsula are at peak levels since 2022, a year in which the North Korean armed forces conducted a record number of missile tests and in which South Koreans and Americans resumed their large-scale military drills. EFE

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